One Departure Too Many
by Queen of Dreaming
Summary: Kairi would wait for Sora forever, if he didn't keep leaving. Until one day she leaves herself.


There's a train station on the edge of the Destiny Islands. It's not as pretty as the rest of the world; faded seats and chipped walls, the occasional crumpled wrapper. There aren't many people, either. The trains mostly carry freight and mail; none of them have more than one passenger car, and by the time it reaches this stop it's usually deserted. The Islands aren't big enough to justify a railroad running through them, so the only place this leads to is the mainland, and it's a long way away.

Today, though, there's a little group of six standing on the platform. It's kind of sad, really, because the group hasn't been together for years except to say goodbye. There've been a lot of goodbyes going around, come to that.

The flurry of hugs and tears settle down, and the silver-haired man clears his throat. "Well… that's it, then." He grabs the shorter girl and the tall, bulky blond and tugs them away, and the redheaded man follows, leaving behind a rather incongruous pair. The man's outfit is all bagginess, chains and zippers; several parallel scars streak across his right cheek and onto his neck. His hair defies gravity and he stands as if he's waiting for something to try and claw him to death. The woman's hair is pulled back; the only decorations are the two silver bracelets and a zipper on her pink skirt. Judging from the way they're look at each other, though, they do fit together.

"Thanks for waiting to leave until I could come and say goodbye," the man finally says.

"It's the least I could do." She doesn't point out the times he's left without bothering to say a thing. "I'll miss you." _Just as much as I have for years, waiting for you._ She promised to wait forever, and she might have, but it's a long time to wait for somebody who kept leaving.

"I'll miss you too." He fumbles in his jacket pocket for a moment, and pulls something out – a tiny keepsake, cracked and stained. "You're going to need this now – it was originally yours anyway."

"Thank you." Her throat tightens around the words as she takes it and tucks it into the little purse slung over her shoulder. "Be careful out there."

"You too, now." _It won't be the same without coming back to you._ He takes a deep breath and holds his arms out awkwardly, and somehow she steps into them. They squeeze each other, just for a moment, and step back, arms still around each other. They stand there for just another moment, because they know this is going to be the last part of saying goodbye, and then she reaches up on tiptoe to kiss him. She clings to his hair just like she used to, and he rubs her back like he always did, and then it's over.

"Goodbye," she whispers, and before he has a chance to say anything else she turns and hurries into the deserted car. She sees his eyes overflow as she stares out the dusty window, and she thinks _So this is what it feels like to be the one leaving._ She wonders how he could have done this so many times, or maybe it only hurts her.

The city is strange. Stranger than Hollow Bastion, stranger than Traverse Town, stranger than any of the worlds he's told her about. It's crowded and smells of sweat-salt, not ocean-salt, and of less pleasant smells, and it's carpeted in grit and wrappers and cigarette butts. She's never seen a cigarette before; on the Islands they aren't legal. The graffiti says "Call Yuna 555-3987 for a good time" instead of being pictures of people, and when she says they used to play out on an island all on their own, everybody laughs. But it's never dark, and it's never quiet, and you couldn't sit for hours waiting because sooner or later somebody else would need your seat or ask you to get out of the way, and there is always something she can find to do. Sometimes stupid things, sometimes fascinating things, sometimes both, but always something to do, even if it leaves her with a headache and an empty wallet. And there is so much to learn, and so much to be, and it's impossible to imagine him sitting on the other side of the room or coming to meet her down the hall. So as far as she's concerned, the city is an improvement.

~***~

Twenty years later, a respected, successful businesswoman pushes open the door of her high-end apartment. If there were anyone in one of the rooms, they'd be able to hear the clacking of the heels across the floor, the whoosh of the sliding door as she hangs her coat in the closet, and the thud of the briefcase hitting the desk. That last throws up a couple of old papers, which makes her blink. _How did these get here?_ Oh yes… when she was looking through some of her old files last night, trying to find the financial records of her first few days in the city to compare changing prices. She hadn't been too organized back then, nor had she used the system she used now, and in digging through things she'd uncovered an old box of keepsakes. She can't remember why she hadn't put them away – was it the call from Qua Sere Nix Documentaries that distracted her? Probably. She sifts through the papers now – a letter or two, a graduation photo and a yearbook, a pressed flower that she guesses was from senior prom, and a photo face-down near the bottom of the box. She flips it over, and goes very still for a long moment, staring into two sets of glazed blue eyes. It's a ridiculous, cheesy picture, the two of them at some summer festivity. Heads tilted together, strands of red hair mingling with brown and glued with sweat to their skin, hands intertwined at the forefront of the picture, a slight smudge of something turquoise at the corner of her mouth and another one on his nose. It's a cheap instant photo, poor quality and grainy, but she can just make out the charm hanging from his belt. It's probably in the box too, somewhere… yes, beneath the paper that was probably what she'd been looking for last night. A star-shaped pendant, split down one point and chipped on another, coated in dust. She holds it for a moment, and then places it very, very gently back in the box with the photo, and the letters. It's strange, really, to think that she had thought that a little pendant could be lucky, and that loving someone would always be enough, and that eating a bittersweet yellow fruit together would mean you'd always find each other. Strange, foolish, romantic ideas that she would never believe now. She wonders if she'd even recognize her old self without the face to cue her in.

The very next day, the phone clunks into its stand and for just a moment, she stares at it and wonders what the odds are. A moment is all she can afford to allow herself, since she's a busy person, and she calls past the desk. "Allison? Clear me from the twelfth to the nineteenth, please. I have to go oversee a station revamp for a few days."

"Yes, ma'am. Which station?"

"Number 117."

"Gotcha, ma'am," the bespectacled blonde agrees, and the computer keys clatter for a moment. "Hm, gotta reschedule the meeting with Uyematsu Arton… send the memo to the committee on the fourteenth… which one is 117 anyway?"

"You're muttering again, Allison."

"Oh, I'm sorry, ma'am."

"It's all right." The conversation drops for a moment.

"Huh."

"What is it?"

"Nothing, just wondering why I already associated… _oh._ You're going home, aren't you?"

"Not really. I left when I was younger than you and I never went back."

"Looking forward to seeing it again?"

"Hadn't you better be getting back to work?"

"Sorry, ma'am."

The train is a new one due to the project that brought her here, and it's probably the brightest thing on this particular drizzle-filled, miserable day. She tries to work, of course, but it's hard to focus, and time and time again she ends up staring into the fog while the laptop glows on her lap. It's ridiculous to think there is anything important about this. It's only a business trip. Not quite like any other, but still, no reason for her to be this unsettled. Not at all. The place isn't her home any more than Hollow Bastion is. A home is someplace where there are people who know you and love you, and she hasn't talked to anyone from the Islands in fifteen years. It doesn't fit that description anymore. Nothing is going to change.

She isn't going to actually look anyone up, but she does ask the clerk at the hotel if she knows Selphie or Wakka. The latter the clerk doesn't know, but apparently she's neighbors with Selphie and Tidus. They've got three kids now. The town's gotten much bigger since the businesswoman saw it last; they've built a new factory near the center of town, and now there's a real playground on their old island. She wonders if kids still draw things at the Secret Place, and if they've drawn over the old pictures or worked around them. The other party lives in her old house now, and the school has changed from Destiny Island High to Princess Sarah Memorial.

It's early evening on the fourteenth when she realizes there is nothing she actually needs to do, and just for a moment she is lost. Eventually she reaches for her coat, but drops it, remembering where she is. A walk through central town might be nice. Maybe that restaurant is still there, the one she never ate in on her own because it's so expensive, or at least used to be.

The restaurant is still there, and still expensive but she can afford it now, and it's worth the money. After dinner there's still nothing much for her to do, and she decides, just for a moment, to sit on the bench outside the old convenience store and look at the place. It's still pretty, prettier than she remembers it, although the pink light of the sunset helps. The sun is almost down when the man on the other side of the square catches her eye, and she catches her breath because this is the most illogical moment of her life, and she's spent years living her life logically. There is no reason to think this. His hair looks about the right color, but who can tell in the dark? He looks about the right height, but thinner, and at the same time less lanky, and he stands differently. And there's no reason for it to be, because this man looks different and she knows very well that he never settled here, and the odds against the two of them intersecting like this are just too high. It just can't be. There's just no way.

It's all in a moment when her groundless conviction swallows her up, and then the man on the other side of the square turns – not to her. It can't be to her. It just doesn't make sense.

He steps towards her, quickly, and without thinking, she stands up. This is absurd. It's ridiculous. More than that, it's dangerous. It's getting dark out, and he's… and there's a chance that he's a stranger.

It's impossible. It's just impossible.

She whispers his name.

He nods.

It's ridiculous. It can't be happening. It has to be some strange lucid dream. And even if it's real, it still doesn't mean anything will change. He'll still be a wanderer, always leaving her behind. She has a career now, a job, a life beyond him. All this will mean is more pain for both of them.

Regardless of any sense and logic, she touches his hand. He squeezes it and reaches out his other hand to touch her face. His fingertips are a thousand times more callused and she knows he can probably see the laugh-lines around their eyes. For all she knows, he's married. For that matter, he doesn't even know she isn't. But…

"God, Kairi," Sora whispers, pressing his face into her neck.

~***~

There's a graveyard on the far end of the little island. It's a peaceful place, with a sense that if there are any restless spirits here, they are at least not malevolent.

In the center is a tall, elegant marble monument. And if you go three rows past it, and two rows left, and look under the old tree, there are a couple of stones with names carved on them that may be familiar. The epitaphs are brief, thoroughly inadequate for listing everything these two were in life. _ Hero._ _Matriarch. Brave and courageous. Brilliant and diligent. Beloved husband. Beloved wife._

The dates indicate long lives, and both graves are marked with a simple line drawing of a star-shaped, bitter fruit that has just been taken off the Endangered Species list. One that maybe has some kind of unlikely power after all.

* * *

**This is a Valentine's upload, so it may be a little bit rushed. I confess I'm fascinated with the idea of what lies inland on the Destiny Islands. [Insert clever, funny and original non-desperate plug for reviews, positive or negative, here.]**

**There's also a kind of video adaptation of this fic; I started with this and then realized that The Fray's "Never Say Never" fit it pretty well, so if you're interested, add **watch?v=b6u1T9o-cP4 **to the end of the standard YouTube address. Not necessary, though (duh); just out there if you care to see.**


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